<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="1"><font class="post">The following is
my 1-penny breakdown of some popular automation tools, based on my own
experiences. I was the QA Architect at my last job for 4 years and was
the lead of the automation project from the start. Now I am at a new
company doing the same thing, so Over the past 4 months I've tried about
5-6 different applications:
Rational Robot - Used this for 4 years and have lots of experience with it.
Pros:
-- Powerful tools and excellent help via the F1 screen and these forums.
-- SQABasic is just like VB so it is very easy to use and learn.
--
Supports applications written in VB, C++, .NET, Java swing/awt, and web
testing. I used for Java swing & VB6 applications and it worked
excellent
-- Script management is quite decent among multiple users.
Cons:
--
It's outdated. SQABasic is based on VB5.0 and it doesn't have features
like intellisense, auto-indent, auto-case, etc. The IDE is hard to use
when you expect it to auto-fix somethings for you.
-- Patching usually breaks things and takes 40 minutes just for simple results
--
Often when Robot crashes, it brings the system down with it and only a
reboot can save it. Usually only happens when trying to push the limits
of the code. Like trying to step through the debugger while doing
recursive looping of a function.
Other thoughts:
Rational
Robot was possibly king of its time, but its time for an upgrade. I
guess Rational Functional Tester (RFT) was supposed to replace it, but
Rational tends to overcomplicate things with installs and licensing, I
downloaded RFT but never really got it setup correctly.
Cost: Licensing ranged from ~$4000 (more for the suite)
TestComplete - Used this for about 4 months.
Pros:
-- Very nice little 65MB installer and it was all encompassing to itself. License was simple.
--
Lets you use any scripting language it supports (vbscript, javascript,
c#script, delphiscript) so it doesn't have to worry about proprietary
language support.
-- Supports applications written in VB, C++, .NET,
Java swing/awt, and web testing. I used for Java swing & VB6
applications and it worked excellent
-- F1 help is limited locally, but vbscript and javascript references are abundant on the net.
-- It formulates itself to use object oriented scripting on the fly, making the code smaller and use object based intellisense
Cons:
--
Because it uses generic "objects" as the type for everything, it tends
to have extra long descriptors within its recognition string, often
extending well past the screen margin. A bit annoying.
-- Also, due
to everything being a generic object, intellisense was there, but
limited and often not specific to the type of control or object you were
working with.
-- Crashed one of my companies programs trying to get a
proprietary table. Not really TC's fault I guess, but Test Partner and
QA Wizard Pro didn't have that problem.
Other thoughts:
This
was the first automation tool I tested after working 4 years with Robot.
I was intrigued! Its so much faster and better looking than Robot, and
possibly more powerful. The only main bad thing like I said was the
extra long recognition names, especially for java, it had to write out
the complete classes for each section of the hierarchy.
Cost: Licensing ranged from ~$999-$2999
QA Wizard Pro - Used for 2 months
Pros:
-- Very nice and intuitive IDE. Full object recognition support for lots of controls.
-- Excellent documentation using F1
-- VBscript-ish language, very easy to work with
-- Supports .NET, VB, C++
-- Extremely intuitive recognition string referencing: Window("myApp").Button("OK").Click()
-- Self-contained install, Unbelievably powerful for 40MB size
--
Could work in "grid view" or "code view". Grid view was the nitty
gritty of the functions, code view showed the actual code behind it.
Great for people who aren't very familiar with programming.
Cons:
-- Never got it working with Java. I can't remember if they didn't support java or I just didn't try hard enough.
-- Some addons cost extra.
Other thoughts:
I
really liked QA Wizard, with the exception of the java support, it was
really quick and intuitive. And the IDE layout is extremely useful.
There was some minor bug when you try to cancel recording while the
verification point window is up, had to restart QA Wizard to fix, but
that is something that will likely be fixed in upcoming versions.
Cost: I think licensing ranged from ~$2000-$4000
WinTask - Used for 1 month
Pros:
-- Fast execution
-- Cheap
Cons:
-- No Java support. Only things that it can see with its Spy++.
--
No object recognition. Only basic capture of text. Pretty much killed
it for me due to my job requirements, but not bad for the price
Other thoughts:
WinTask is more than just a simple playback macro. It uses its own language but its very intuitive and easy. Great
for simple screen checking or simple form entry. Not quite powerful enough for GUI scraping.
Cost: ~$250
Compuware TestPartner - Used for 1 month and still using it.
Pros:
-- Uses VB6 language, complete with intellisense, auto-indent, etc
-- Full F1 help for VB6 as well as the TP tools for recogntion
-- Does everything that all the programs above can do, plus some.
-- Supports applications written in VB, C++, .NET, Java swing/awt, and web testing. I used for Java swing & VB6
-- Verification Points are very intuitive and have lots of excellent options
-- Identifier (spy) is extremely intuitive and fast.
-- Multiple database options for repository.
-- Comes included with a "Visual Test" version, but I prefer code-based as I need to make variable changes for my framework.
Cons:
-- None so far really!
Other thoughts:
I absolutely love moving from Robot to TestPartner.. feels like evolution. I even copied many of my scripts over from Robot and got to keep 90% of the code intact
TestPartner was my final choice.
I
tried many free automation tools. Most are a waste of time. Some might
be good for web testing, but nothing compares to the usefulness of these
big boys for proper application testing.
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